Contrast The American Dream With The Real Life Of The Migrant Worker

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‘Of Mice And Men.’

                                Contrast The American Dream With The Real

                                          Life Of The Migrant Worker

  In 1930's America, most Americans had the so-called American Dream, which was to own their own piece of land and to be their own boss. The dream came into existence in the 1800's, when land was readily available. By the 1930's, when this novel ‘Of Mice And Men’ was set, it was almost impossible to make the dream reality as most land had been bought beforehand.

                                                     Migrant workers are labourers who work on ranches as harvesters, skinners, and swampers, carrying heavy materials and doing many other manual jobs. They work hard and earn poor wages. They also have no friends or family as they continuously travel to different ranches in California, and so therefore they have very few possessions such as tinned food, small mats, blankets and shaving blades etc. They carry their possessions in a bindle and are commonly called ‘bindle stiffs’ or ‘bindle bums’, as they carried them on their back. Migrant workers sleep in bunkhouses which are situated on the ranch. They share a bunkhouse with other workers of that ranch. There is little privacy in the bunkhouses as there are usually between four and six workers in one bunkhouse. They are allocated their own shelf or cupboard in which to keep their very few possessions. Migrant workers wear denim clothes as denim is hard wearing and so they don’t have to keep on buying clothes with their hard earned money which can be spent elsewhere. Workers do not have any rights such as sickness payments, old age pensions etc, from their ranch. So when workers retire they have a very grim future in prospect. To be able to work, workers were issued with work cards from the local job agencies. The work cards were only given if a ranch boss wanted new workers. Work cards were important as it gave them a work permit. Workers also feared the sack, which was the case if someone done something wrong. The had no choice of menus as meals were cooked by other  workers. If they wanted a different meal they would have to go outside the ranch in the town which workers have to pay for themselves. There was little justice on the ranches and workers had to develop their own rules of behaviour to survive.

                                              The novel we read is called ‘Of Mice And Men’. It is set in California, America, in the 1930's. ‘Of Mice And Men’ is mainly about two American migrant workers. One of the workers is called Lennie and the other worker is called George. The writer of the novel, John Steinbeck, shows us in detail their lives as migrant workers, with the other workers, and Steinbeck also shows us the dreams and aspirations of these two migrant workers and the other workers. Steinbeck also shows the reality on the ranch and what they actually experience.

       George and Lennie are very close friends. In fact Lennie cannot move without George, as George is a father like figure to him. Lennie has a mental disability and acts like a small child, though he is a very powerful man as seen in his first description, ‘...a huge  man, shapeless of face, with large pale eyes, with wide sloping shoulders, and he walked heavily, dragging his feet a little, the way a bear drags his paws’. Lennie is frequently described through animal imagery due to his physical features, eg ‘like a terrier who doesn’t want to bring a ball to its master’, ‘strong asa bull’, ‘Lennie covered his face with his huge paws and bleated with terror,’ Lennie growled back to his seat...’ . This consistent use of animal imagery echoes Lennie’s love of and devotion to animals of his own, especially rabbits, mice and puppies. Lennie is a gentle giant, who brings out trouble. Lennie is doomed in a world of desperate moral confusion. He cannot survive in a world of cruelty, selfishness, and disgrace. Throughout the novel, Lennie is portrayed as sympathetic in loving terms, eg ‘.....Lennie’s jus’ like a kid. There ain’t  no more harm in him than a kid, neither, except he’s so strong’. George about (Lennie), ‘He ain’t bright. Hell of a good worker, though. Hell of a nice fella, but he ain’t bright’. Lennie’s innocence ‘I won’t get in no trouble, George. I ain’t gonna say a word’. Slim about (Lennie) ‘He’s nice fella. Guy don’t need no sense to be a nice fella’. George’s description is completely opposite of Lennie, and Steinbeck’s initial description emphasises the physical difference between him and Lennie, ‘ The first man was small and quick, dark of face, with restless eyes and sharp strong features. Every part of him was defined. Small, strong hands, slender arms, a thin and bony nose’ .

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                                               The novel ‘Of Mice And Men’ commences a few miles south of Soledad, near the Salinas River. It is warm and tranquil. It is important to mention the opening part of the novel as this is where George identifies a spot where, if Lennie gets into trouble , he can go to and hide, ‘If you jus’ happen to get in trouble like you always done before. (In Weed, Weed is a town in California where George ...

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